This is our April 2015 update of news from the RespiTech group at the WIMR. April has been busy month for the RespiTech Team and congratulations all-round for such a productive month!

Firstly, Yang Chen submitted her PhD Thesis and took a short break before she returns as a PostDoc in May. Well done Yang! Also this month Giulia Gitana D’Arco, Mariam Mamlouk and Larissa Gomes gave their first year PhD talks to the Woolcock during its morning seminar program. Great talks girls! YY (Hui Xin Ong) also returned from her ERC fellowship in the UK this month. YY will rejoin the group as a postdoctorate research fellow and will work between the Woolcock and Westmead Hospital to establish a number of clinical based research programs. Welcome home YY!

The group have also had a successful month publicising our research. The group had 7 publications accepted in peer reviewed journals in the last 30 days.Wing-Hin was first author on two papers accepted in Expert Opinion on Drug Delivery (IF 4.1) and Journal of Biomedical Nanotechnology (IF 7.6) in the area of nanotechnology. The first is a review of nanoparticles for macrophage targeting entitled ‘Nano- and micro-based inhaled drug delivery systems for targeting alveolar macrophages.’, while the second is an original research article entitled ‘Synthesis and characterization of inhalable curcumin nanoparticles for lung cancer therapy’. The group had a second review accepted in Expert Opinion on Drug Delivery authored by Jesslynn Ooi entitled ‘Determination of physical and chemical stability in pressurised metered dose inhalers (MDIs): Potential New Techniques.’ Two papers were accepted in the European Journal of Pharmacetuics and Biopharmaceutics (IF 4.2) in May. The first by YY entitled ‘Is the cellular uptake of respiratory aerosols delivered from different devices bioequivalent?’ while the second from Mehra Haghi is entitled ‘Inhalable tranexamic acid for haemoptysiss treatment.’ Sumit Arora also had his work accepted for publication this month in Molecular Pharmaceutics (IF 4.8) focussed on development of anti-fungal lung therapies. Lastly, Eric Zhu was first author on a article in European Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences (IF 3) entitled ‘The formulation of a pressurised metered dose inhaler containing theophylline for inhalation.’ Well done all! You can find details of each of these articles (abstract and link to main text where available) on our publication page.

Looking forward to May, a number of the group will travel overseas to attend conferences and meetings. Who knows even our lego scientists may join us…